Born in Mexico City on May 30, 1966, he studied at the
Instituto Científico y Literario in Toluca, Mexico and in the National School
of Medicine in Mexico City. He received his medical degree in 1909. He was a
military physician in Bacum, Sonora; Jalapa, Veracruz; and Guaymas,
Sonora. In 1915, he became a professor of physiology and clinical medicine
in the Facultad Nacional de Medicina and of biology, physiology, and human
physiology in the Escuela
Médico Militar. He became secretary
of the Faculty of Medicine (1917-21), member of the
Consejo Superior of the Department of
Health (1921-23), director of the medical school (1924-34), and Rector of the
National Autonomous University of Mexico (1934-35)
He was chosen Rector by university conservatives who were
trying to prevent a leftist from taking control of the university. The
government and leftist students and professor were advocating that UNAM become
socialist. Without strong government backing and the funds that would have
brought, Ocaranza could do little. Having been elected in September, 1933,
he resigned in November, 1934. He would return to UNAM in 1945 when
Mexican president Manuel Avila Camacho appointed him to the first governing
board of UNAM. He wrote about his rectorship in La
tragedia de un Rector, a book
published in 1943.
As an historian, he published El Imperial
Colegio de Indios de Santa Cruz de
Tlaltelolco in 1934, Crónica de las
Provincias Internas de la Nueva España
in 1939, and Capítulos de Historia
Franciscana in 1933-1934. He also
wrote Juárez y sus amigos. His published his autobiography,
Novela de un Médico, in
1940. Among his medical books were published Lecciones de Biología
General, Fisiología Humana, Fisiología
General, and Historia de la Medicina en México.